On the weekend of July 12th, I participated in the Toronto Outdoor Art Fair for the first time. To say that it was incredible would be an understatement. It was wonderful to see people respond to my art and sources of inspiration in real time. The positive comments I received were extremely validating and have definitely given me more motivation to work on my upcoming projects.
Minutes into my first day, I made my first sale! My collector loved that the piece was inspired by the short story "Games at Twilight" by Anita Desai and asked for a copy of the book that I had with me. I couldn't give it to her at the time, but I did after the art fair when we met for coffee. I found a kindred soul in that collector, and we are now exchanging handwritten letters!
Each work came with a handwritten letter with the story of the painting
I met artists I had admired for a while, Raoul Olou and Caroline Ji and many more for the first time at the fair: Alex J Marks, Emily Au and Matthew So were some of my favorites.
I was excited to be approached by galleries and even a book publisher! A big highlight of my fair was being featured in this CBC Arts Newsletter!
Outdoor eye candy (cbc.ca)
I also participated in the Budding Art Buyers program, which is a wonderful program for kids under 14 to purchase artwork donated by the artists. I met my youngest collector and was able to give her a handwritten letter with the story of the piece.
Thanks to the Travel Bursary Program, I was able to fly out from Alberta and attend the fair in person! Here are some sketches from the airport done with my Pentel Brush Pen.
Ill be applying for the bursary again next year and I hope to be able to visit again!